Don McNay, CLU, ChFC, MSFS, CSSC is the bestselling author of the book Wealth Without Wall Street: A Main Street Guide to Making Money. McNay, who lives in Richmond, is an award-winning financial columnist. You can learn more about him at donmcnay.com. His new book, Life Lessons from the Lottery: Protecting Your Money in a Scary World, was just released on Amazon.
 

To read more of Don McNay’s columns, click here.
 

It’s another tempest in a teapot.
 

According to the fired director of the IRS, it began as a bright idea by the person in middle management. Wouldn’t it be a good idea that would save time and money if they singled out groups applying to the IRS for 401 (c) 4 status (non-profit) for close scrutiny if they likely were political — which isn’t supposed to get tax-free status?
 

Groups that qualify under this section of the tax code are supposed to promote social welfare, but a lot of them obviously are promoting political causes. Nothing wrong with their promoting these causes, but they aren’t supposed to get to call themselves nonprofits and pay no taxes if they do.
 

Tea Partiers and “patriot” groups are usually political, so they would be a good place to start, thought the man—or woman. It might even earn a promotion or a bonus (which it did). But the idea person’s work had a fatal flaw — it didn’ include the left as well. (Maybe it did, but we won’t know that until later, long after the hue and cry have reached a crescendo.
 

Too bad the idea didn’t come sooner. The tax code has been breached and a flood of political groups already has come through, one of the biggest being Carl Rove’s Crossroads group. Yes, of course it should have included the full spectrum. It’s not that doing what he or she did is wrong. It’s that it didn’t go far enough. There are far too many political groups getting away tax-free to spread their slime and lies.
 

So, now our president is “angry.” Never mind that he fired the head of the IRS first and launched an investigation second, like something out of Alice in Wonderland. “Verdict first and trial second.” And the Republicans are” very angry.” Under the leadership of our red-faced Speaker of the House John Boehner, they may want to get a lynch mob going. And it won’t just be going after the thinker. They blame the president, so they’ll try to lynch him, too. They’ve already symbolically, at least, lynched Susan Rice over an incident in which she had almost no involvement. And they’ve maybe bloodied the person who may be the next Democratic candidate for president. So, with the empowerment that came from that why not lynch them all?
 

Feeding the fever, the media are “angry.” No, not just Fox News. Even such usually sensible folks as David Gregory of Meet the Press. The newspapers, too, are part of the angry mob, though for the most part not quite as sanctimonious. Poor, poor journalism all around.
 

But the angriest are the Republicans. That is not new, of course. They have no accomplishments, unless you call shutting down government an accomplishment, so they try to create diversions. They are quite good at that.
 

And why is the president so “angry?” Why doesn’ he get the facts first?
 

Rep. Pelosi says she will introduce changes that will close the tax loophole and keep us from having all the political groups pouring through into tax-free status. Would that she could, but getting that corrective past Mr. Angry Red Face and his “party of no” colleagues is highly unlikely. While you’re at it, Ms. Pelosi, why not also include the religious organizations that are allowed to make a mockery of the First Amendment by endorsing candidates while enjoying tax-free status?
 

One can see why so many in the voting public are cynical about Washington. Will this charade never cease?
 

Lewis Donohew retired from the University of Kentucky College of Communications in 1999 after nearly 35 years of service and having earned a national reputation as a communications scholar and researcher. Now down on his farm growing grapes and living close to the earth, he contemplates issues of the day from a lifetime of experience and a love of the land.
 

To read more from Lewis Donohew, click here.

Its cooler cannabis cousin, marijuana, gets all the buzz — generational bards from Bob Dylan to Snoop Dogg sing Mary Jane’s praise; cancer and AIDS patients declare her glory.
 

And even though smoking hemp won’t make you feel high — just really stupid for trying (as well as a sharp burning sensation in the lungs) — the Feds still crack down on it because they think it kinda … sorta … .ooks like the wacky weed that threatens to send our nation back into reefer madness. Just another innocent casualty in the War on Drugs.
 

In recent weeks, however, it appears that hemp might have the last (sober) laugh. That’s because a bipartisan, blue-grassroots effort to secure federal legalization of industrial hemp production might not only prove successful; it could also provide a model for solving far more pressing issues within our hyper-partisan, dysfunctional democracy.
 

===
 

To understand why the hemp movement is going mainstream, consider one of its strongest advocates: first-term Kentucky Agriculture Commissioner James Comer. The GOP official shocks the hemp stereotype: He’s neither the liberal hipster nor the bow-tied libertarian, each hoping the movement will bring us a step closer to legalized marijuana.
 

Instead, the 40-year-old, rosy-cheeked beef cattle farmer is part and parcel of his rural, small town, socially conservative upbringing, a culture that’s traditionally been most hostile to hemp legalization … mostly because, well, they fear it will bring us a step closer to legalized marijuana.
 

And Comer, a political comer who’s popular with both the Mitch McConnell GOP establishment and the Rand Paul Tea Party, is passionate about agriculture. Seeing his vocation under siege, particularly upon the decline of tobacco, Comer risked ridicule by campaigning on an issue that many lampooned, and few of his constituents understood. But he stubbornly embarked on a statewide educational campaign with a simple, irrefutable message: Hemp is not marijuana.
 

Click here to read Jonathan Miller’s full article, which first appeared on Newsweek/The Daily Beast.
 

It is excerpted by permission from The Recovering Politician.
 

- Jim Cliffton, The Coming Jobs Wars (2011) and CEO for Gallup
 

Hope is the catalyst for success in life. Hope is an essential element for people to believe that they can achieve and that they will be rewarded for their efforts. Loss of hope is devastating at all ages.
 

Gallup discovered in its “whole” world polling in 2010 that children become school dropouts “when they lose hope to graduate.” These students are not excited about their future and their prospects for a good job. Clifton writes, “Gallup has discovered that having a good job is now the great global dream; it’s the number one social value for everyone. This is one of our most powerful findings ever.”
 

We see the hopelessness by some in our Appalachian Kentucky region that is plagued by poverty rates three times the national average and high unemployment rates. This hopelessness is scientifically recognized in the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index in which the 5th Congressional District ranked last in overall sense of Well-Being, Life Evaluation and Emotional Health. In the midst of these challenges, a large number of energized citizens with a can-do spirit have chosen to focus on the abundance of talent and potential human capital in the region to positively change the narrative.
 

We in Appalachian Kentucky understand that education is the key to improving the quality of life here. However, it is necessary to have the quality jobs for the educated citizenry. The Appalachian citizenry must create many of the new jobs and not wait for them to be brought here.
 

Stakeholders in the Appalachian Teaching and Leadership Network (ATLN) are convinced that we can use our “rural genius” to usher in an Appalachian Renaissance, raising educational levels and growing the economy. We have seized upon the innovative Kentucky Work Ready Community program created by the Kentucky Workforce Investment Board as the blueprint to tie education to job growth. The process will organize the communities to improve the quality of life, generate positive publicity for the counties, and enable the Eastern Kentucky Region to be the first “Rural Ed-conomy Empowerment Zone” in the nation.
 

ATLN is working with the 13 counties in the Kentucky River and Big Sandy Area Development Districts to begin the process of each becoming a Work Ready Community and, thus, more attractive to employers and native entrepreneurs. While Work Ready Regions are not an official designation in this program, when the counties each meet the Work Ready Community criteria individually and become certified, contiguous counties within Kentucky can promote themselves as a Work Ready Region. The achieved designation will increase pride in the work of the community, while building a network to improve the education and local economy.
 

The Kentucky Workforce Investment Board is to be congratulated for its overall strategic plan to transform the workforce development system, which includes creating this certification so counties can validate the skill level of the workforce. Participating in this effort offers counties the opportunity to transform the local economy and gain a competitive advantage in attracting new businesses and jobs.
 

The process is designed to align education, workforce development and economic development strategies for the state and within communities by using a collaborative approach. Most importantly, it sets the bar high for educational achievement and college and career readiness, which will encourage communities to creatively and effectively collaborate and use their resources to devise strategies to reach the benchmarks.
 

To qualify for the Work Ready Community status, counties must meet certain thresholds in criteria such as high school graduation rates, National Career Readiness Certificate holders, educational attainment rates, soft skills, available broadband Internet access, and counties must also organize an inclusive planning group. A Work Ready Community In Progress designation allows counties to present a plan the meet the goals within three years.
 

The criteria will encourage community leaders to work with K-12 districts to improve graduation rates; increase adult education participation and success rates; promote working age persons to get at least a two-year degree and credentials needed by employers; address work ethic/soft skills development and credentialing for both secondary school and postsecondary educational adult populations; and work to get broadband access to 90 percent of the county along with strategies to enhance computer literacy for the populations.
 

ATLN is working with other stakeholders to promote youth leadership and entrepreneurism. Talented Appalachian youth must have avenues to use their creativity and initiative and have a reason to remain in the region. The Center for Rural Development in Somerset has some impressive youth leadership and entrepreneurism programs. These and similar programs must be expanded to more young people.
 

ATLN and the Kentucky Valley Educational Cooperative conducted the STARS (Students Transforming Appalachia with Real Solutions) Challenge. Teams of students from schools in local districts participated and demonstrated their research and problem solving talent to a broad community audience. STARS provide great learning experiences available to teams of students confronting real world challenges.
 

This year’s challenges had students focused on their community’s level of “work readiness” and were engaged in developing a strategic plan for their community that addressed five of the six critical areas for work readiness as defined by the Kentucky Work Ready Community program. The competing teams were recognized at the ATLN summit in Hazard on April 24.
 

Appalachian youth are one of the stakeholders in the planning process to raise educational levels, increase college and career readiness, grow the regional economy and produce Points of Hope. Together, we can all increase “hope” in the future.
 
 

Ron Daley is the dean of Administrative Services at Hazard Community and Technical College.
 
 
 

Do they really believe this, or do they even know what these labels mean?
 

Well, Tea Partiers, in this column I am going to tell you a few things you apparently have been slow to educate yourselves about. I can somewhat understand this if you get your information from sources such as Rush Limbaugh, a master of teaching hate, or Glenn Beck, who finds conspiracies, teaches fear and sells gold.
 

As part of their propaganda to get you to believe they’re telling you the truth, they have persuaded you that the media (i.e., newspapers and those media which follow their format,which are the only sources run by people trained to be fair to both sides), is really part of the conspiracy. (OK, I know you’re not reading this by choice, but maybe pacifying a friend who puts it in front of you.)
 

So here is a brief primer on which is what.
 

No, Communism, Fascism and Socialism are not the same thing. Even though a movie short on one of your websites lumped all of these ideologies on the far left, in fact only one of them is — Communism. Fascism — what Hitler represented — is the polar opposite of Communism, on the far right, over where many of your people are.
 

In describing these ideologies, we have to distinguish between economic systems and political systems. The two main divisions of economic systems are capitalism and socialism, and for political systems, democracy and authoritarian systems. In the former, the people have the power to choose their representatives in government and to elect someone else if they’re not satisfied. In the latter, leaders often are first established through military coups, then select their successors from the top.
 

Here are some definitions:
 

Socialism—An economic system in which the government does much of the planning rather than leaving it to the marketplace. The government often provides education, health care, and other services free or at low cost. Socialism may operate in either democratic or authoritarian systems. Scandinavian countries combine democracy and socialism. In Norway, for example, students have access to free education for as long as they can qualify by passing tests. At the college level, they also receive a modest living allowance.
 

Capitalism—An economic system in which goods and services are offered according to demands of the marketplace. A primary advantage of capitalism is in motivating individuals and companies to achieve. A primary disadvantage is that, if left unregulated, companies gobble each other up until one receives a disproportionate share of the market and can exercise considerable power over pricing and over government. Another disadvantage is that capitalism won’t provide some services the people need if those services don’t provide a certain level of profit—such as internet service in hard-to-reach areas, or, farther back in time, electricity in those same areas before the FDR administration had it established through co-ops.
 

Communism—As conceived, it was to be a utopian political and economic system in which everything was owned communally, in which each person contributes according to his abilities and takes out according to his needs. That’s not how it has turned out, of course. It became dictatorships in Russia, China, and Cuba, for example. Although it attempts to provide for the basic needs of its citizens, as an economic system, it didn’t work very well. Russia and China changed to capitalist systems, but did not adopt democracy as practiced in the United States and other Western countries.
 

Fascism—An authoritarian political system, in which all major decisions are made at the top. The clearest examples of fascist governments were those of Germany under Hitler and Italy under Mussolini. This is the type of decision system advocated by author Ayn Rand, whose work is admired by Paul Ryan. You know, the Paul Ryan who claims Tea Party support.
 

Democracy—In our form of it, the people elect representatives, including a president, to represent them and make decisions at the national level (other decisions are reserved to the states, which similarly have representatives elected). All this is done within the guidelines of constitutions (federal and state). Whether or not the guidelines are correctly followed is determined by the courts, one of the three branches of government, the other two being executive and legislative.
 

In making or rejecting laws, the legislators assess what will be declared legitimate or illegitimate. There can be several contradictions in this, and not all cases are appealed to the courts. (In recent action, for example, those who believed that any regulation would violate the constitution, refused to pass a law—even one for checking the backgrounds of those buying guns of any size. (Curiously, those who would not allow even the mildest of regulation on guns are demanding waiver of constitutional protections of U.S. citizens requiring that they be given speedy trials by their peers and be sent to a military court for trial. That, of course, is the Boston bomber. Few would have sympathy with him, but what would waiver of the constitutional guarantees mean for future cases where the evidence is not as clear?)
 

That was lesson one. Don’t believe me? Awww.
 

Lewis Donohew retired from the University of Kentucky College of Communications in 1999 after nearly 35 years of service and having earned a national reputation as a communications scholar and researcher. Now down on his farm growing grapes and living close to the earth, he contemplates issues of the day from a lifetime of experience and a love of the land.
 

To read more from Lewis Donohew, click here.

Think the pairing of this proud progressive and the conservative Comer to be somewhat unusual? Let me further blow your political assumptions: We will be joined in our advocacy by the unlikely alliance of GOP Establishment favorite Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Tea Party poster child Sen. Rand Paul, and liberal Democratic stalwart Congressman John Yarmuth.
 

This rare burst of No Labels-style Washington bipartisanship is merely a reflection of the broad, deep and diverse support for hemp’s legalization among Kentuckians of all political persuasions. This March, the Kentucky General Assembly overwhelmingly passed Senate Bill 50 — sponsored by GOP Senate Agriculture Committee Chair Paul Hornback, and strongly championed by Democratic House Minority Leader Rocky Adkins — that establishes an administrative and law enforcement structure for hemp growers should the crop be legalized at the federal level, and would empower Kentucky to jump to the front of the line and establish itself as the national leader on the crop once federal approval was granted.
 

How have liberals, conservatives and everyone in between found such common ground? It’s because the case for hemp legalization is so compelling:
 

• While support for legalizing hemp’s distant cousin, marijuana, remains controversial (I support legal pot; Comer does not), hemp is not marijuana. The two plants are quite distinct in the way that they appear physically and are cultivated agriculturally. Moreover, smoking hemp can’t get you high; it just might make you feel a little stupid that you tried. Industrial hemp has less than one percent THC, while marijuana ranges from 5 to 20 percent THC content.
 

• Legalized industrial hemp production could emerge as a prolific cash crop that could bring hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue to Kentucky, and many billions of dollars to the United States. There are more than 25,000 uses for the crop, including rope, clothing, automotive paneling and door installation — even makeup.
 

• Most exciting to me — as a clean energy advocate — is hemp’s application as a clean-burning alternative fuel. Hemp burns with no carbon emissions and produces twice as much ethanol per acre as corn. While bio-fuels critics have raised alarms at the diversion of food products into fuel production — causing spikes in food prices — hemp has no such negative economic side effects. As the U.S. struggles with the dual enormous challenges of climate change and dependence on foreign oil, industrial hemp could become a powerful weapon in America’s energy independence arsenal.
 

Only one thing stands in the way of this exciting economic and environmental progress: The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) continues to classify hemp as an illegal, controlled substance, regardless of its THC potency.
 

Accordingly, Comer and I — and our bipartisan federal delegation — will be lobbying Obama Administration officials this week to provide Kentucky a waiver from the federal regulations; or better yet, to encourage the DEA to reclassify industrial hemp as legal, regulated agricultural crop.
 

But while our lobbying efforts will hopefully produce some progress, the key power is in your hands. While a majority of Americans now support legalized marijuana — and presumably a much larger majority supports legal hemp — only when you share your support with your elected officials will they feel the political pressure to take action.
 

Here are three very simple things that you can do — right now, at your computer — to register your support for legalized industrial hemp and pressure Washington to fulfill the people’s will:
 

1. Contact your Senators to urge them to co-sponsor and support S. 359, the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2013. introduced by Sens. Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Rand Paul (R-KY) that would exclude hemp from the definition of marijuana and allow states to legalize and regulate the product.
 

2. Contact your Congressman and urge him or her to co-sponsor the companion bill in the House, H.R. 525, the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2013, introduced by Congressman Thomas Massie (R-KY).
 

3. To sign the petition to President Obama, urging his Administration to lift the barriers to legalized hemp, click here.
 

This column is from Jonathan Miller’s TheRecoveringPolitician.com. It is used by permission.